Within, Outside and Around in Art

A visitor to a Kindergarten class this morning would have observed boys in motion--gleefully covering their classroom in multi-colored strips of tape-- red, blue, pink, orange, yellow tape everywhere--on the walls, strung across desks, even on the doorknob.

All of this action was part of an innovative session with an educator from the Guggenheim, our neighboring museum, which the boys will be visiting soon. The educator talked to the boys about installation art, art that is experiential beyond 2- or 3-D. The class discussed how lines can convey emotion (e.g. straight lines may represent tranquility, while up-and-down lines anger or agitation) and related this to the works of Van Gogh.

Then the boys got up and got creative, turning their class into a colorful work of installation art that they could move within, outside of and around. This is a wonderful way for our young boys to understand installation art by engaging in the process of creating it.

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